Known as the 39champagne of teas 39 darjeeling tea is famed for its sparkling clarity of taste and crystalline sweetness benefitting from the steady rainfall light soil and cool air of the himalayan foothills the british first established plantations in darjeeling in the 1840s using seeds smuggled from china and some of the original 39china jat39 bushes are still cultivated todaypicked during the second harvest of the year between may and june this 39second flush39 darje